Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton shakes hands with husband and former U.S. President Bill Clinton after the second 2016 Presidential Debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. (Photo : Getty Images/Joe Raedle)
The U.S. Justice Department announced on Oct. 31, Monday, that it will dedicate all resources at its disposal to review emails potentially linked to Hillary Clinton. The announcement comes in the midst of mounting public pressure over the surprise revelation by the FBI that it had found emails in an unrelated case.
Earlier, the FBI stated that it will require sorting through several thousand recently discovered emails in order to renew examination of the practices by Democratic presidential nominee and her aides. This had raised questions about whether or not the FBI will be able to release any findings before the Election Day, the Associated Press reported.
The emails were discovered on the computer of Anthony Weiner, a disgraced former New York congressman, who is being probed regarding alleged online sexual communications with a teenage girl. Early this year, Weiner separated from Huma Abedin, who is one of Clinton's closest advisers.
The timing of the FBI director James Comey's revelation regarding the existence of the emails in a letter to the Congress on Oct. 28, Friday, is significant because the Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has been utilizing the opportunity to assail Clinton more and more vigorously.
In fact, the agents were planning to review the new emails over several weeks. However, law officials said that following a surge of condemnation over the weekend, they scrambled to examine the trove of emails found on a computer seized during an unrelated investigation involving the estranged husband of a Clinton aide.
While the FBI is expecting to complete the initial round of assessment in the coming days, it has not decided on the course of action yet. The officials were still not sure whether they will publicly disclose the results of their findings, or whether the complete review would be finished by the Election Day.
Meanwhile, though the FBI chanced upon the emails from Weiner several weeks back, it did not make the discovery public until Friday, CNN reported quoting the U.S. law enforcement officials on Oct. 30, Sunday. This has given rise to questions as to why the agency did not reveal the matter earlier and disclosed this just few days before the Election Day.
In fact, the investigators seized several computers related to the inquiry in early October, they told the website. FBI's technical experts started cataloguing the emails found on one computer and discovered that they belonged to Weiner.
Several top FBI officials, including its deputy director Andrew McCabe, were briefed on the issue. By mid-October Comey also came to know that investigators in the Weiner case may possibly laid hands on something, which could influence the closed probe into Hillary Clinton's private email server. The investigators told their director that they were still trying to ascertain the precise number of emails and how they could be related to the probe into the Clinton case.
The investigators briefed senior Justice Department officials on the issue about a week ago and on Oct. 27, Thursday; they gave a complete briefing to Comey. Subsequently, the FBI director shot off a letter to the Congress saying that the agency was assessing some emails which may be related to the Clinton case.
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